1. field of the Invention PA1 2. Description of the Prior Art
The present invention relates to an automatic sheet jogging and stapling machine which assembles sheets of paper into a bundle having aligned edges, staples the bundle together, and gravitationally releases it for subsequent stacking. Such machines may advantageously be utilized in printing and photocopying businesses where documents, having many pages of identical size, are produced or reproduced, assembled, and bound to form pamphlets or booklets. Similarly, such machines may be used in offices or other businesses to assemble and bind multipage documents in a quick, efficient, and reliable manner.
Because present printing and photocopying apparatus operate at high speed, it is important that paper assembling and binding machines used with them also be capable of similar high speed operation. Moreover, such machines should be compact and easily integrated with existing equipment. It is also desirable to automate a document assembling and stapling operation when the documents have large numbers of pages that would ordinarily be difficult to staple by hand.
Paper jogging and stapling machines are presently known. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 2,994,881 (Kaufman) discloses a machine having a downwardly inclined tray provided with two side walls to form a U-shaped paper guide. A previously assembled bundle of paper is deposited on the tray and slides down its face until stopped by two pins that project upwardly from beneath the tray's surface. A microswitch is mounted to be tripped by the paper bundle as it slides through the channel and operates a delayed action relay which in turn operates a stapling head. After the stapling operation is complete, the stop pins are withdrawn beneath the tray surface to permit the paper bundle to fall into a bin.
Though uncomplicated, such prior art machines have several drawbacks. For example, the machine disclosed in the Kaufman patent relies on the impact of the paper bundle against the stop pins to longitudinally bounce and jog the individual paper sheets to thereby longitudinally align the sheet edges. Further, it doesn't jog the paper sheets in a lateral direction at all. The paper bundle is assembled before it is introduced into this machine and if not properly laterally aligned, the bundle may bind between the side walls of the paper tray and interrupt operation. Accordingly, such machines may not be well suited for use with the high speed printing and office equipment.